


the sky that we look upon

by televisions



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: F/M, Female Friendship, Fix-It, Gen, Making Up, Missing Scene, Multi, Snow Ball (Stranger Things)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-10
Updated: 2017-12-10
Packaged: 2019-02-12 21:00:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12968331
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/televisions/pseuds/televisions
Summary: At the Snow Ball, Eleven and Max talk things out.





	the sky that we look upon

Hawkins Middle School looked like something out of a dream. 

Every dream that Eleven had had over the last year, of dancing and music and _Mike_ , they were all coming true. Hazy shades of blue and silver had transformed the gym — the room in which her nightmare began last year — into something unrecognizable. Something magical. 

She’d gotten her dress and makeup from Hopper, who’d gotten it all from Joyce. It was uncharted territory; growing up at the lab, she’d never had any notion of beauty or style or femininity. It was an entirely alien concept. She’d picked up on some of those things from the television shows that she’d been watching, but most of it was still a shot in the dark. She tried her best to remember what Kali had done to her hair and face back in Chicago. Hopper offered his help several times, but she was determined to do everything on her own.

Before they’d left for the dance, he had gruffly told her, “You look great, El,” voice wavering a little bit, and he’d placed a hand fondly on top of her head. “You deserve this.” 

But her self-consciousness wasn’t fully squashed until she and Mike locked eyes in that gym, and the first thing out of his mouth was “You look beautiful.”

Despite the sea of people surrounding them, despite the unfamiliar music and their complete lack of dance skills, Eleven couldn’t have been happier. This was perhaps the one thing that she’d wanted most for the past year, and now she had it.

Eleven was not used to getting what she wanted.

After she and Mike had swayed to some slow songs (and kissed once or twice), a few notes of a new track sounded out, and she instantly recognized it. “Oh!” She pulled away from him, grinning. She was thrilled to actually be able to identify something. “Hopper plays this.”

Mike furrowed his brow, concentrating on the music, trying to place it. “The chief likes Springsteen?” He laughed, like this was a secret that he’d been let in on. “Oh man.” He took Eleven’s hands in his own and pulled them back and forth between the two of them, matching the upbeat pace of the tune. A playful smile teased across his lips, and Eleven couldn’t help but giggle. 

As Springsteen belted out “ _The highway’s jammed with broken heroes on a last chance power drive_ ,” Mike lifted one of her hands and twirled her around. She didn’t think she’d ever felt so light.

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

A few minutes later, the two were trying to catch their breath near the punch bowl. They’d danced themselves silly and laughed until their stomachs hurt. Mike, ever the gentleman, poured Eleven a cup full of strawberry punch, which she was sipping when Dustin bounded over.

“Hey lovebirds!” Dustin clapped Mike on the back, a huge grin on his face.

“What’re you so happy for?” Mike stared at him suspiciously.

“Oh, just the fact that I danced with the hottest girl in the room.”

“What? Who?”

“ _Nancy,_ of course.”

“Ugh, gross!”

Their bickering faded into the background as a voice to Eleven’s right asked, “Having fun?”

It was Lucas.

Eleven nodded eagerly. “Yes. Are you?” 

“Yeah! Yeah, the Snow Ball’s kind of a big deal. I’m glad you’re here. _Finally_ ,” he added, nudging her shoulder.

Eleven smiled bashfully. “Me too. You look nice.”

Lucas grinned, opening his jacket by the lapels, and turned on his heel like a model. “You like? Picked everything out myself. You look great too. I’m sure Mike’s ecstatic.”

“Thanks.” She looked around and realization hit her. “Where’s Max?”

“Oh, the restroom. Uh, speaking of Max…” He grimaced a little, then launched into a spiel. “I hate to ask, but do you think you could talk to her sometime? At least give her a chance? I really think you guys would be good friends. I don’t really know what happened between you two, or what happened between her and Mike, but—“

“Lucas. Okay.”

“You…huh?”

“I’ll do it.”

Truthfully, now that she’d reunited with Mike and some time had passed, she felt a little bad for rejecting Max so quickly. She didn’t know what kind of relationship that Max and Mike had, but shepersonally hadn’t spoken with Max. Not that she saw the rest of them very often anyway — visits allowed to the cabin were few and far between, and Max, understandably, never tagged along.

“You will?” Lucas exhaled in relief. “That’s great, thanks. Seriously. I promise, she’s super cool.”

“Okay.”

Lucas patted her shoulder with a smile, then walked over to pull Dustin away from Mike.

Mike was at her side a few moments later. “Hey. Sorry, Dustin’s being an idiot. Still doing okay?”

“Doing great.” Eleven put her cup down on a table and paused for a second. Something overcame her then as she remembered Lucas’ words, and she knew what she had to do. _I really think you guys would be good friends._ “Where’s the restroom?”

“The hallway. It’s out the doors and sort of to the left, if you know where that is. Want me to take you?” His voice had a hint of anxiousness in it.

“Mike.” She gave him a look, knowing exactly what he was worried about. “I’ll be fine.”

“Right. Sorry. I’ll be here.” He raised his punch glass in a sort of ‘cheers’ motion and downed the rest of it.

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

Eleven didn’t quite know what her plan was, once she stepped into the hall. She stood awkwardly outside of the gym doors, trying to think about how to go about this. Open with an apology? Try and avoid it for a while during the conversation? 

She was so deep in thought that she almost didn’t notice a certain redhead come out of the restroom and walk right past her.

“Max." 

Max stopped abruptly, one foot already through the doorway to the gym. She whipped her head around to look at Eleven, then behind her, then back at Eleven. “Me?” She let the door shut again.

“Is there…another Max?” Eleven could hear just how cautious she sounded, how she struggled a little to form the right words. She hated it, despite praise from Hopper and Mike and just about everybody about how quickly her speech had come along. She especially stumbled over her words when she was talking to somebody that she didn’t know all that well.

Max pulled a face, like she thought Eleven was being snarky, and Eleven worried that they’d get into an argument or something. She hadn’t considered the possibility that Max wouldn’t want to speak to her. But then her face softened into something more neutral. It had been an honest question, after all. “Uh…no. Just me.” She shifted her weight awkwardly. Eleven noted that she looked almost like a different person without that skateboard under her arm.

“Can we talk?”

“I guess so?” Max was looking openly apprehensive now. She took a few steps forward, head cocked. “Why?”

“Come with me.” Eleven motioned to the other end of the hallway. Max crossed her arms. 

“ _Why?_ "

Annoyance bubbled up in Eleven, but she steadied herself and pushed it back down. Max had the right to be uneasy around her. Of course she did. “Because I’m sorry. And I want to explain.”

Max swallowed, eyes scanning Eleven’s face. She appeared to be searching for words — a concept that was painfully familiar to Eleven — but after a few moments she simply nodded. 

The girls walked down the dim hallway, streamers and banners hanging silently over their heads. The music coming from the gym bled through the walls, some upbeat tune that made Eleven want to dance. She still didn’t know how, but she thought that she and Mike were doing a decent enough job. The contrast between the brilliant brashness of the gym and the isolated hallway was like night and day.

Eleven sat down on a stray plastic chair at the end of the hallway. (It wasn’t very comfortable; were all school chairs like this? Ouch.)

Max was still looking at her with a bewildered expression, so Eleven waved her hand at the other chair next to her. “Sit.”

Max plopped down onto a low step on the floor instead. “What is this?”

_Might as well jump right into it_. “I want to apologize. The way I treated you was…bad.”

Max sighed, looking off to the side. She tucked a fiery lock of red behind her ear. “That’s an understatement.” She bit her lip. “Why didn’t you want to shake my hand?”

Max still wasn’t looking at her. Eleven pressed her lips together and stared down at her hands in her lap. “I don’t know. I guess I was angry.”

“Angry at me? You didn’t even know me. I was just introducing myself.” Max looked at her then, eyebrows drawn. “Right? Or do you have extra-freaky intuition powers or something?”

There was a tone of skepticism in her voice, even after all that had happened. It was sort of funny.

“No. I didn’t _know_ you, I just…” What could she say? There was no explanation. “I was behaving like a brat.”

_Yeah, well I’m not so crazy about you either. You know why? ‘Cause you’re a brat. You know what that word means?_ _How about that be your word for the day, huh? ‘Brat,’ why don’t we—_

Max laughed, uninhibited, pulling Eleven out of her thoughts. “Kind of, yeah.” Her grin faded quickly into a more serious expression. “But…I dunno, you’ve kind of been through a lot. And you saved all our asses that night. So…” She trailed off, lifting a shoulder.

Eleven almost, _almost_ let that go unchallenged. 

“No. I was wrong. I hurt you. I’m sorry.”

Max nodded. “Well. Thanks.”

They lapsed into silence, both girls glancing around at the decorations on the walls, avoiding the other’s gaze. The silence was awkward in a way that could only happen between two people who didn’t know each other all that well. It was heavy and thick, blanketing them all around. Max’s fingers caught Eleven’s eye, though; they tapped against the step to the beat of the muffled music, and something on her ring finger glittered as it caught the light with every movement. Eleven saw the opportunity and seized it.

“What’s that?” She stood up from the chair and moved to sit on the step. 

“Huh?” Max followed Eleven’s eyes. “Oh, this?” She shook her head, looking down at the ring on her finger. “Lucas got this in some cereal box. It’s kind of stupid.” But she was smiling fondly at it, twirling it around and around.

Eleven reached for her hand, and she could practically hear Hopper’s voice in her head saying “ _Boundaries, kid,_ ” but she pushed the thought away. Max scooted back a little as Eleven grasped at her wrist, examining the plastic ring. 

“Pretty.”

Max blinked in surprise. “Um, yeah.”

Eleven released her hand, smiling. She’d never had another girl to talk to. Nearly every moment of her life, as far back as she could remember, was spent surrounded by men. It was kind of exciting, the idea of having someone just like her to talk to. Not a boy, not an older sister with special abilities — just a normal girl. Eleven wanted to be normal, more than anything.

“Lucas. He’s a good friend.”

“Yeah, he is,” Max said. “He’s the one who told me all about you. Everyone else wanted to keep secrets from me.” She rolled her eyes.

“Secrets?” That piqued Eleven’s interest. She hadn’t considered how much Max might have known — or not known — about her.

“Yeah. I mean, now I get that it was for my own safety, but Lucas was the only one who even seemed to care about that. Dustin wouldn’t elaborate on anything. And Mike…” Max exhaled. “I don’t know, he just doesn’t like me.” 

Eleven furrowed her brow in confusion. “Why doesn’t he like you?”

Max huffed out a laugh. “ _You_ didn’t like me, until about five minutes ago.” She shook her head. “I don’t know. I think he just didn’t like the fact that I was a girl, with you being gone and all.”

“I thought you were friends.”

“Not by a long shot.” Eleven must have had a concerned look on her face, because Max quickly added, “But maybe it’ll be better now that you’re back. I think he’s a lot happier nowadays. You guys seem really…happy.”

“He is. We are.” Eleven pressed her lips together, thinking for a few moments. “I can talk to him, if you want.”

“That’d look kind of desperate, wouldn’t it?”

“He’d listen.” Eleven smiled reassuringly. Max lifted a shoulder.

“If you want.”

Eleven studied her, thoughtful. She got the feeling that Max didn’t always say what was on her mind. Eleven did the same, but that was usually because she didn’t quite have all of the words needed. If Max’s thoughts were voluntarily withheld, Eleven’s were clawing to be let out. Still…the two of them were more similar than not. 

“Friends?” Eleven held out her hand.

A bit of light streamed into the dim corner of the hallway through the glass panes of the gym doors. A rectangular patch of light fell upon Max’s features, softening them, as she turned her head. She looked emotionally guarded, somehow, when she extended her hand to Eleven’s. “Sure. Friends.”

They shook once. “Friends,” Eleven echoed affirmatively. 

“Um, listen,” Max started, dropping her hand. “I still don’t really know the full story. About you, how you met the boys, why you,” she lowered her voice with a cursory glance around, “…have powers. I mean, I do, sort of, but it’d be cool to actually hear it all from you. Not right this second, obviously, but just sometime.”

Eleven leaned back on her palms. “It’s a long story.” And it was. There were parts of it that she, herself, had not totally pieced together yet. She occasionally forgot that not everybody spent a lifetime looking for answers and grasping at straws. Not everybody had their lives stolen from them. Very few people — only ten others, perhaps — could truly know what it was like.

“Right, yeah.” Max nodded, pushing her hair off her face. “I figured. You don’t have to tell me. From what I’ve heard it sounds pretty crazy. It…must be hard.” She paused, mouth open, as if she were debating upon whether to say something else. But she just repeated, almost like an afterthought, “Must be hard.”

Eleven’s eyes welled up, and she looked to the side, away from Max. “Yes.” She didn’t know exactly which part of her story Max had been referring to as ‘hard,’ but the words had unexpectedly affected her anyway. Even Hopper, as much as he tried, sometimes seemed to forget all that she had gone through, when she was having a particularly angry day.

She blinked to clear her eyes. “I’ll tell you. Sometime. Promise.”

Max’s face brightened. “Okay. Cool.” She rubbed her palms on her pants. “Well…Lucas and Mike are probably looking for us, right?” She got to her feet. Eleven nodded, following suit.

Just as the girls reached the gym doors, they swung open, and a slightly disheveled-looking Mike burst through. “Oh. El.” He exhaled, posture dropping back down into something less tense. “Everyone was looking for you. I was starting to get worried.” He looked at Max, then back at Eleven, slightly perplexed. “Are you okay?”

“We’re fine,” she said, glancing at Max. “We were just talking.”

Max nodded at Eleven in a goodbye and slipped through the left side of the doors into the gym, not looking at Mike. Mike didn’t seem phased at all by this, and it made Eleven remember her promise to talk to him for Max. Maybe not tonight. But soon.

“Wanna go back in?”

Eleven nodded, and he took her hand with a smile.

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

On the dance floor, the swarm of other people pressed in on them. The only direction to go in was towards each other — not that Eleven wanted to go in any other direction. Not away from Mike. Not now, not ever. 

As a few opening beats of a song rang out, some adult that Eleven didn’t recognize, a teacher, maybe, announced over the microphone that this would be the last song of the night. Some people groaned. Eleven’s heart sank; she didn’t know when she’d be able to do anything like this again, at least not for a while.

“What the hell? Why do they keep playing these old people songs? Is it Mr. Clarke’s fault? Mr. Clarke!” Dustin called, throwing his hands up and stalking off. Will rolled his eyes and followed him.

“Whatever. This is one of my favorite songs,” Mike said to her matter-of-factly, shaking his head. 

_When the night has come, and the land is dark, and the moon is the only light we’ll see…_

Eleven didn’t recognize it, but if it was Mike’s favorite, then it was hers too. 

A little ways away, a flash of red caught Eleven’s eye, and she watched as Max and Lucas swayed to the music. They looked so content. Jealousy rose in Eleven, something painful that made her chest tighten. Why did everybody else have all the time in the world to spend with each other? Why was she destined to live a life full of rules and restrictions? It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t—

“Hey.” Mike gently took her chin and turned her face towards him. He knew what he was thinking. She could tell by the look on his face. “Don’t look like that, okay? Just enjoy it.”

_I won’t cry, I won’t cry, no I won’t shed a tear…_

She removed her hands from his shoulders and pulled him into a hug instead, pressing her face into his shoulder. Mike didn’t miss a beat, just held her closer and rocked them back and forth.

_Stand by me._

Eleven could have stayed right there forever.

**Author's Note:**

> hi all!
> 
> i really struggled with choosing what to call eleven. i love the idea of her going by jane, and i think "el" is humanizing as well. "eleven" sounds a bit clinical to me, but i just used it because it's what we know her as. i'm sure next season will explore this concept. (this was my first time writing for Stranger Things, and i haven't read any fic for it either, so i'm not sure how others have handled this.)
> 
> also, will just wouldn't fit into this story for some reason! sorry will :(
> 
> thanks for reading!


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